The Futurama gang has traveled back in time on several occasions and by several different methods, but usually when they do they manage to find something a lot more interesting than in Simpsorama. They’ve looted ancient treasures, gone back to the American Revolution, and been in and around December 31st, 1999 more times than I can count. But for an episode that goes and stays in (relatively) contemporary America, the best comparison is easily Roswell That Ends Well.

Both episodes put Fry, Leela, Bender and the Professor in fish-out-of-water situations, but Roswell That Ends Well not only gives them something meaningful to do along the way, it also puts them in an actually interesting place with actually interesting characters. Simpsorama has dull characters lurch from one unconnected situation to the next, never developing any kind of momentum (story wise or comedy wise).

For starters, just look at the characters we get to see. Simpsorama has the one-note remains of Professor Frink making lots of weird noises because that’s his catchphrase. Roswell That Ends Well has all the government scientists who become increasingly frustrated in their attempts to study and dissect Zoidberg. One of these gives you “glaven flaven” for fifteen seconds, the other gives you “Uh, it’s free” when Zoidberg thinks their experiment is a buffet, “the same deviled egg” during their old fashioned alien autopsy, and “The President is gagging on my gas bladder. What an honor.”

Is President Truman coming on to Dr. Zoidberg? He’s not hearing a no.

Similarly, the entire Simpson family doesn’t possess nearly as much character as Fry’s grandparents. While they can be secretly gay, get blown up in an atomic blast, sleep with their own time traveling grandson, and hear about how the implosion trigger functioned perfectly, the Simpson family has become so flat that they can do little more than repeat catchphrases, or, as the case may be, catch-actions: with Homer strangling Bart-clones being something they thought so funny that they twice did it repeatedly.

The respective settings are just as divergent. Springfield is a shell of itself at this point. The long established locales (Moe’s, Barney’s Bowlarama) don’t have anything left to offer, which is why all they could think to do in both was have Bender extend his arms. There’s something we’ve never seen in either place: a robot from the future with really long arms!

The new spots, this mysterious horse track and (just for the hell of it) Panucci’s Pizza, were there as filler and fan service. The first was another interchangeable locale for Bender to be a jerk, which would be fine in a regular episode but feels, shall we say, a bit undercooked in a long promised crossover. The second was a quick and nonsensical reminder of one of Futurama‘s most memorable moments. It didn’t need to be there, but it did check one more item off the “let’s cram stuff in” list, so I guess there’s that.

By contrast, in Roswell That Ends Well, we get an almost Simpsonized version of a post-war 1940s military base. There’s the Sgt. Carter like lunatic NCO who wants to eat in the latrine, the obsession with secrecy that leads to shipping President Truman in a wooden crate marked “Canned Eggs”, and the blundering ignorance of the top military officials who can’t understand a theft minded robot carcass or a lonely and annoyingly talkative crustacean. The whole thing is classic fish-out-of-water comedy and it provides plenty of opportunities for the characters to act like it (“You really don’t cook enough roasts, Leela.”). Having Bender fit in at a few random Springfield locales isn’t.

The same is true of the Simpson family after they get sucked into the future (for some reason). While there, they spend most of their time sitting around a table before easily herding the previously uncontrollable Bart-clones into Madison Cube Garden in time for the ending. Sure, they went to the future, but we don’t get to see them do much, and since there isn’t much to do, the jokes are predictably lame:

Marge: Homer works at a nuclear plant. He can help us get home.
Professor Farnsworth: Oh, are you good at your job?
Homer: I was voted employee of the month as an April Fool’s Day joke. [resume strangling]

And:

Lisa: Attention goblins, Madison Cube Garden is filled with Butterfinger bars, and people are laying fingers all over them.

It’s the usual litany of weak Zombie Simpsons writing (expository background, general nonsense, and Sitcom 101 setup-punchline-laugh crap), it just happens to be in the future.

Here you go, fans. Enjoy it.

To see how all of that stuff ads up to such weak television, just compare the two endings. In both, Bender is stuck a thousand years in the past. Here’s how it plays out in Zombie Simpsons:

Lisa: Wait, wait, wait! You’re the portal? How are you gonna get to the future?
Bender: The old fashioned way.

At that latest expository question and answer, Bender turns himself off for a thousand years. In Futurama, we see the crew rescue Bender’s body and Zoidberg, steal the microwave dish they need, and then blast their way out of the base. Bender’s head plummets back to Earth as he tells 1947 to kiss his shiny metal ass. The episode has already shown us what’s happening, so we don’t need it explained, and we get a context appropriate, and extra bitter, rendition of Bender’s favorite saying.

When things get around to wrapping up, we also get two very different actions. In Zombie Simpsons, Homer pours a beer into Bender’s deactivated head. Bender replies, “Thanks, buddy.” In Futurama, the crew finds Bender’s head and “rescues” him from what they think of as a thousand years of lonely torment:

Fry: Bender, what was it like lying in that hole for a thousand years?
Bender: I was enjoying it until you guys showed up.

Well, the Futurama crossover finally happened. It had a few good jokes here and there, which is above average for Zombie Simpsons, but mostly it was a mess and suffered from the same kinds of crossover problems we all so recently suffered through with Family Guy: cramming in as many characters from Futurama as possible, whether or not putting them there is funny or necessary. It’s a thing that happened, a little footnote to both shows that will never be confused with the cream of either canon.

– I love Hedonismbot, but that couch gag was way too long. The tag “A Show Out of Ideas Teams Up With a Show Out of Episodes” is easily the best joke in the episode, though.

– We open with Skinner telling the students they have to put something in a time capsule. Then Chalmers appears from nowhere to fire a spitwad at Skinner. This is not a promising start.

– Chalmers just pulled a TV-VCR combo from out of nowhere.

– The time capsule ceremony was just interrupted by an instant rain storm for some reason.

– Bender just fell out of the sky during a thunderstorm. Which lead to a full minute of Homer and Bart trying to find him in the basement. They settled on hanging Bart upside down from a rope for some reason. Then they pointlessly smacked him around for ten seconds.

– Now we’re at Moe’s. Bender belched fire.

– The premise here is that Bender and Homer are friends. It’s charming enough, though predictably dumb.

– Hey, how about some fan service?:

Lisa: You know, they look a little similar.
Bart: Yeah, like the guy who designed Bender just took a drawing of Dad and stuck an antenna on it.
Lisa: A little lazy, if you ask me.

– Lisa took Bender to see Frink. Frink reboots Bender. Now Bender’s supposed to kill Homer, who just showed up after not being there until now.

– Writing “Crossovers Are Hell” on the wall in the future was nice. Even if it’s not funny for the reason they think it is.

– I guess it’s nice that these mutant rabbits are another nod to Groening, but color me unsurprised that they went with mass chaos for their crossover.

– More fourth wall jokes with Zoidberg.

– They had to get Fry and Leela (and the Professor) back in time somehow, I get that. But it’s very out of character for Leela want to kill Homer. Obviously she doesn’t actually do it, but it’s pretty weird nevertheless.

– Heh: “Okay, but remember, to me you’re incredibly stupid.”

– Hey, it’s Seymour! The fan service is pointless and not that funny, but it’s easily the best part of this thing.

– Homer and Bender are asleep on the couch together for yet more fan service.

– Ugh, this scene where they’re trying to figure out who to kill really drags on.

– I get that crossover stories are weird, but having the plot keep popping out of Bender’s ass is still dumb.

– Case in point, now we’re flashing back to the beginning with the time capsule. This isn’t that complicated, but we’re getting reminded of it just because.

– “In our time, Epcot Center is a work farm for the weak.” That was funny.

– They drove to the time capsule and then Willie showed up for some reason.

– Bender’s ass just gave us our brief and pointless appearances from Amy and Scruffy.

– Everyone but Bender and Maggie just got sucked into the future for some reason.

– Oof, the animation on Homer strangling Bart here is really weird. They drew Bart the same size as all the little creatures.

– It was weird for Leela to want to kill, but why on Earth would Marge think Homer can fix a generator in the future?

– And now Hedonismbot showed up again for some reason.

– I could cite a bunch of different examples, but if you want an idea of how much of a mess this episode is, just noodle this series of events:

Lisa: If there’s one thing I know how to do, it’s manipulate Barts.
Bart: You’re nuts. I’ve got a will of iron.
Leela: [Turns on Hypnotoad]

It’s doesn’t make sense, but it did cram something from Futurama in.

– Back in Springfield, Bender just blew up a racehorse.

– More pointless fan service: Lisa playing a holophoner.

– Oh, and all the Barts just got rounded up.

– Heh: “Wow, it’s working! I guess the instructions were in English.”

– Now Bender just shuts himself down for 1000 years.

– I suppose Kang and Kodos needed to meet Lrrr and Ndnd.

– There are some good sign gags in this credit/opening sequence at the end, including a Stonecutter headquarters, “Eat My Shorts” written in the alien language, and Freeze Frame Industries.

Anyway, the numbers are in and I was apparently being too optimistic last week when I predicted 7 million viewers. Even with the football lead in, just 6.59 million people wished they’d done this episode fifteen years ago. FOX has a late national game again next week, but after that it’s two weeks with no late football. I’ll be curious to see whether or not they even bother to broadcast new episodes.

Futurama went off the air for the third time on Wednesday. (I’m saving the last episode for this weekend and haven’t watched it yet, but the internet seems to have generally liked it.) That departure prompted a slew of eulogies and comparisons to The Simpsons, and we have some of them. In addition to that we’ve got some really cool fan made stuff, a lot of video game links (two of which aren’t about Tapped Out), the return of Me Blog Write Good, and lots more.

Enjoy.

I WANT A BABY! – Smooth Charlie’s Link of the Week puts the Tapped Out game to a good end. The author used shrubs, lawn chairs and various other in-game items to create a great picture of Maggie . . . with Bobo! Excellent.

Here’s the lowdown: after finishing those final extra reviews, I intended on writing up a grand finale, a “What Have We Learned?” if you will, to serve as a final recap of my thoughts about the entire series, or at least the first 444 episodes of it. But, alas, reality intervened. Hours at my new job skyrocketed, to the point that I was working six, seven day weeks up from February to about mid July, with nothing to show for it but crazy overtime pay and IMDB credit on six summer movies. At that point, my heart wasn’t up to completing the recap.

Very understandable. Also, couldn’t have said this better:

But is it even worth it? By the last couple seasons, I felt I was spinning my wheels with my reviews, because my complaints were becoming repetitive, since the show kept pulling the same shit over and over, whether it be ineffective joke telling, piss poor characterization, or inept attempts at parody or satire.

Just remember, you’re in show business now. Repetitiveness is your job. Your job.

But wait! The Simpsons has 727 episodes while Futuramahas 140 which means the latter has run for 19.25% as long as The Simpsons. Futuramais 96.3% as good as The Simpsons (6.5/6.75) which means that Futuramashould ideally run for 700.1 episodes.

I love Futurama, but believe me when I say that making another 560 episodes would be a soul crushing thing to sit through. Shows that go on too long are not a good thing.

i’m back. – The epic last nine months of a graduating nursing student as told with multiple Simpsons YouTube videos. Bravo on the Simpsons references, and congratulations on everything else!

Blog Archive Starbucks Coming To Kings Highway – Click through for the awesomely amateur dubbed Russian YouTube of Bart getting his ear pierced. (And speaking of Russian Simpsons hybrids that deserve more attention: this, which was on the related videos. I have no idea what it is beyond vaguely Christmas-y, but it’s wonderfully weird.)

Homer Simpson Donuts! – Recipe with step by step instructions for how to make perfect Homer donuts. Look at these:

Transcendent. As the post says:

Dunk the donuts in the glaze and then place on a cooling rack. Add sprinkles. You have to. It’s part of the recipe. I swear. Now devour the donuts.

“In the Cape Fear movies the father is able to protect his family when he throws aside his civilized values and abilities, and engages the villain on his own primal terms; Bart can’t take this villain on; in some ways the play is about what strategies you develop in a world where you are truly helpless.” From Act Two, Mr. Burns:

QUINCY

I hear they’ve got a stash of lithiums, and 10 of those super powerful camping flashlights, and they’re going to do a dusk to dark showing of “A Streetcar Named Marge,” with a spotlight finale at the end.

Take the arrival of Mrs. Krabappel (Nedra McClyde). She’s Bart’s teacher on The Simpsons, but here, she’s the all-knowing Chorus, guiding us through the history and ethics of what’s on stage.

Someday this play will be on in a part of the country that isn’t prohibitively expensive from me to reach, and then I will finally get to see it.

The 24/24 Challenge – PART 1 – Cleaning out a backlog of video games with one hour samples of play. This was the verdict on The Simpsons Game:

Another game I played before years ago and made another (soon to be regretful) nostalgia purchase. The saddest part (like the Ghostbusters game) is that having the voice actors reprise their roles makes this seem like a lost episode, and the writing is pretty spot-on for later Simpsons episodes. Then you have to suffer thru the game by actually picking up the controller and attempting to wring fun out of the mediocre gameplay. While the levels do look amazingly well-constructed and in-line with the look of the show, actually running around the stages is not nearly as fun as it should be. It kinda has a PS2 level of unpolish on it, if you know what I mean. Just sloppy in all the wrong ways. Fighting is just basic button mashing at its simplest and laziest. And I thought we fixed crappy cameras years ago….guess not. Another one of those “looks great plays meh” kinda games (also like Ghostbusters).

HOW MUCH DID I PAY FOR THIS GAME: Around $12 on Glyde.

WAS IT WORTH THAT MUCH: If I could have got it cheaper, I would have.

DID I WANT TO KEEP PLAYING THIS GAME AFTER THE FIRST HOUR: Not really. Is it sad to wanna keep playing just to hear the dialogue?

WILL I KEEP PLAYING THIS GAME/PLAY IT TO COMPLETION: Possibly, if I can fight my way past the horrid camera and quirky controls.

If there’s one downfall to this game, it’s the fact that it’s made by EA. EA owns the rights to all Simpsons video game media (as evidenced by the surprisingly excellent The Simpsons Game) and they will use any excuse to extract your hard earned money from you. Most games today have some sort of option to pay real dollars to help you along in the game or access premium content to make your town feel….well cooler I guess, I haven’t figured it out. In this game, donuts are the form of premium currency, as they have apparently been affected by the radiation of the nuclear blast to distort time and space. A player can use donuts to speed up the timing of a building or job, or to purchase a character or building that regular in-game money can’t buy. EA puts the opportunity to buy donuts everywhere, the items that donuts buy plentiful, and the opportunity to earn donuts virtually nonexistent. Of course it’s a free app, so people can get through without purchasing anything with real money, but it really drives someone crazy when they have to wait two days for a building to complete so you can move onto the next part of the mission.

Ask anyone about their favourite Simpsons character and you will be met with a variety of responses. Highest are probably Homer and Bart followed by some lesser characters like Ned Flanders, Moe Syzlack, Lenny and Carl or even some more obscure characters like Duff Man (can’t breathe). No one, but no one, has ever said Lisa. When I proclaim my personal affection for this precocious little girl, I am met with blank looks and wails of ‘Why?

Copying an already successful formula is one thing but the Simpson’s Road Rage commits a second cardinal sin of failing to properly replicate the experience of the original. If you mimic an idea well then people will be forgiving of shameful attempts to piggyback on others successes but when it’s not a patch on the original any flaws in the game are magnified. In this case the driving is extremely buggy and broken causing the arcade experience to be extremely frustrating and even more so when compared to the brilliant and obvious inspiration behind this title.

The issue was in the singer’s voice. He did a fairly passable imitation of Brian Johnson at times, but it quickly became obvious that he has not yet mastered control of that howl. Did you ever see that episode of the Simpsons where Homer’s shirts turn pink in the wash, and he gets sent by Mr. Burns to a mental institution for being a free-thinker, and while inside he meets a guy named Leon who thinks he’s Michael Jackson? This sounded like that – at times, kinda like AC/DC, at times exactly like a 40-something factory worker who smokes a pack a day. The between-song banter was all in the factory-voice, causing the whole thing to be a little surreal, and it took a few lines into the songs for him to get back up to where he wanted to be in the growl. Strange, indeed.

Day Two – what a day! – More photos from the Simpsons area at Universal Studios (which is neither universal nor a studio, but that’s another matter). This one gets bonus points for the t-shirt with Homer and Marge as they looked on prom night.

Generally, the Fourth Wall Greeting is a comic trope, which makes sense given how silly it is – Stephen Colbert and The Simpsons’ Troy McClure being two of the more notable users of the trope. (The 138th episode spectacular features the show returning from an advert break to find McClure asleep on the couch.)

Forget all that song-of-the-summer twaddle. You know “Blurred Lines” has achieved pop-culture prominence when someone spots a potential Simpsons adjacency and decides to do something about it. After hearing this mash-up, Marvin Gaye’s “Got to Give It Up” might not be the only song that “Blurred Lines” reminds you of. (bit.ly/1aFDiEz)

20 Mind-Blowing Facts You Never Knew About The Simpsons – This is major pageview whoring since you have to click through for each one, and there’s nothing likely to be all that fresh for readers of this blog, but it’s not a bad time waster. Also, it explicitly and frequently agrees with us:

If it had ended before the turn of the century The Simpsons would have been crowned the Greatest TV Show Of All Time. Sadly with a twenty-fifth season starting at the end of this month it’s now more deserving of the title Greatest TV Show To Ever Fall So Far Into Mediocrity.

For the last few years, even the most hardcore Simpsons’ fan would have difficulty arguing against the fact the show has seen a big decline in the quality of its funnies.

I realize that mainstream publications are used to thinking of “hardcore” fans as diehard defenders of whatever program or franchise they don’t think gets sufficient respect. When a beloved show gets cancelled or has a terrible movie adaptation come out, it’s always the “hardcore” fans who make the ruckus and defend things against all comers. But the continued march of Zombie Simpsons has reversed that when it comes to “hardcore” Simpsons fans. For us, it’s the casual fans who defend the show and the hardcore ones who rip it. Odd, I know, but since it isn’t going to change any time soon it’d be nice if newspapers, magazines and the like would pick up on it.

Tell Aaronson and Zykowski:

“Fry, this stuff was garbage when it was new. Let’s blow it up already.” – Leela

I have not yet watched the new Futurama episodes that were on last night, so I have no opinion on whether or not they suck. The reviews, both professional and from fans, have been almost universally positive, and I take that as a good sign. But in one respect the return of Futurama has already been a success, because every time someone mentions it they also mention The Simpsons, and that often leads to discussion of how badly the elder show has decayed. So this week we’ve got not one, not two, but three people who bashed Zombie Simpsons. It’s nice. There’s also some love for Lisa, something I didn’t know about “Homerpalooza”, a truly bizarre short story loosely based on “Lisa the Vegetarian”, Marge in both cake and fruit form, and the usual usage.

Homer says, “Hey boy! Wanna play catch?” Bart says: “No thanks dad.” Homer mutters under his breath, “When a son doesn’t want to play catch with his father something is definitely wrong.” Grandpa Simpson over hears his son and chimes in, “I’ll play catch with you son!” Homer says, “Go home old man.”

It’s really not even close. The actual exchange is:

Homer: Bart, son, you want to play catch? Bart: No. Homer: When a boy doesn’t want to play catch with his old man something is seriously wrong. Grandpa: I’ll play catch with you, son. Homer: Get the hell out! Grandpa: I’m gone.

Disturbing Simpsons – A very strange, bizarrely animated take on “Lisa the Vegetarian”. Dr. Nick steals her kidney at one point. (via this and Springfield Springfield’s Twitter feed)

Senior Quotes – Homer Simpson did, indeed, have a great quote in his yearbook.

Homer Sees Homer – Click this, right now. Sadly there’s no location given, which probably saved me a lot of money because I would travel a very long way to get my picture taken in front of such a work of absolute genius.

Here come the girls! – One writer’s list of her favorite female characters. Mom and Leela from Futurama are on here, as is this:

Lisa Simpson – “The Simpsons.” (Pretty much my hero when I was growing up. She gave an extremely erudite voice to nerdy bookworm girls everywhere! I wanted to play the saxophone because of her. Sadly I lack any form of musical talent.)

Hey cartoons, enough with the counting and on and on with the fucking colors. – An impressively unhinged rant (accompanied by lots of images) against today’s gentler cartoons. Lots of references to Simpsons (sadly there is one image from the Zombie Simpsons era), and only a little bit racist. Personally, I don’t hate these shows that much – except for Dora the Explorer. You can get high and watch Teletubbies and be pretty entertained, but Dora should not be watched by anyone over the age of two. I’m serious about that, it’s actually too juvenile for three year olds.

Crowd: Down with taxes! Down with taxes! Mayor Quimby: Are these morons getting dumber or just louder? Aide: Dumber, sir. They won’t give up the bear patrol, but they won’t pay the tax for it either.

It should read:

Crowd: Down with taxes! Down with taxes! Down with taxes! Helen Lovejoy: Won’t you think of the children? Mayor Quimby: Are these morons getting dumber or just louder? Aide: Dumber, sir. They won’t give up the bear patrol, but they won’t pay taxes for it either.

Nit, picked.

Courtney Love: Behind the Music – The restart of Behind the Music did Courtney Love recently and Alyx at Feminist Music Geek goes into all the details. I had no idea Hole had that many albums, shows what I know. Here’s the Simpsons part:

I found including footage of Love hanging out with Sonic Youth noteworthy, as there were no interviews with band members. Kim Gordon’s insights would be especially useful, as she co-produced Hole’s caustic debut Pretty On the Inside. However, Gordon believes Cobain was murdered, and veiled references to Love’s potentially amoral quest for celebrity in songs like “Becuz” suggest that no love is lost. I remember hearing in the commentary track for The Simpsons‘ “Homerpalooza” episode that Love was originally cast in the episode, but one unnamed act who was in the episode refused to participate if she was involved. I can’t help but think it’s them.

I guess Sonic Youth did more than just steal shit from Peter Frampton’s cooler.

It’s back! – The first of our three Futurama fans who don’t like Zombie Simpsons:

It was easy to be fearful that Futurama would have come back with the quality of a Simpsons episode from the last decade. I would be a liar if I said I wasn’t a little worried even after the movies gave hope. But somehow, Futrama kept things awesome and it all just felt right.

Futurama hasn’t taken anything for granted; it fought for its spot in the TV sun and while it hasn’t always been perfect, one at least gets the impression that its creators are laboring to entertain us. The Simpsons, on the other hand, let success go to its head a long time ago. After Brad Bird left the show in the middle of its 9th season, it underwent a slow, steady decline into utter irrelevance, embodying the same lazy clichés it once skewered with such efficiency. It’s a bloated whale looking for a beach–a living tragedy for those of us who adored it in its heyday–and whatever relevance it once possessed has been squandered by decades of creative neglect.

With the premiere of the new season now over and fans around the globe rejoicing in the Matt Groening created masterpiece’s return, I am left, still in awe at the fact that Fox made one of the worst decisions in the history of TV (Ok, they have made WAAAAY more than one). Fox, you SUCK! I really cannot stand the fact that you can keep a piece of shit like “The Simpsons” on air yet have cancelled Family Guy twice and Futurama years ago. At least they gave King Of The Hill a fair run/final episode.

Fuck you Fox.

Well done, all around.

Tell Aaronson and Zykowski:

I remain at least slightly nervous about the return of Futurama, but this interview with David X. Cohen (who was David S. Cohen during his time on The Simpsons) is pretty reassuring. Everybody’s back and Fry and Leela will not be getting married and moving to the suburbs. The concepts are a clever as ever, and Cohen discusses a number of them. This may be my favorite:

the Professor invents a time machine that only goes forward in time. Once they start going, there is no hope of return. And the initial goal is to just go a minute forward into the future and test it out, but the Professor trips and they’re immediately 1,000 years in the future with nowhere to go but forward. So they spend the episode going further and further through all future history trying to find the technology for a backward time machine.

There’s a lot more there for anyone else who’s looking forward to the return to the 31st century.

Tell Aaronson and Zykowski:

Yesterday we tweeted (twat?) about Groening saying the show would never end. Now comes some much needed context from someone who was actually there:

Futurama: Sadly, none of the voice actors were at the panel because of labour disputes, but Matt Groening was hilarious. He was absolutely fixated on giving out prizes to people asking questions and he didn’t even seem to care about answering them. I wouldn’t be surprised to find him on the street corner trying to hustle with his own merch. In any case, not much was shown or talked about. Next!

The Simpsons: Again, Matt Groening was mainly giving out prizes to Q&A people while other writers answered questions. Although, he did say that he and Danny Elfman make the “s” sound at the end of “The Simpsons” at the beginning of the credits. Fun trivia! Then someone from the Guiness Book of World Records came out and gave them two honours, one for the longest running sitcom in the world and another for being voted one of the most important records in the last 100 years. Good for them! To which Matt Groening shouted to the crowd, “There is no end in sight. Simpsons forever!”

Okay, so he was getting his dick sucked by that Guinness Book of Records crowd and had a bunch of fanboys shouting his name when he said it. I had this horrible vision that he was in some kind of a sit down interview or something. So while we’re still saddled with two more seasons of Zombie Simpsons, nothing has substantively changed beyond that. Whew.

(Also: I continue to think the Futurama voice actors will get back on the show once FOX gets them to agree to work for Itchy & Scratchy money, but that FOX is serious about going forward with new voices, which would amount to little more than a desperate money grab, cannot be doubted.)

Useful Legal Tidbit

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